Godzilla: The Japanese Original
Play Trailer
60th Anniversary Restoration
Friday, May 9 thru Thursday, May 15
Deafening footfalls echo in the blackness. An ear-crushing wail. Then a title card rises, three katakana characters proclaiming the arrival of Japan’s doomsday beast: GOJIRA.
He's back! After six decades of countless spin-offs, knock-offs, homages, and legions of fans, the "King of the Monsters" returns to the big screen like you've never seen him before. The 60th Anniversary digital restoration is uncensored, uncut, and undubbed; featuring 40 minutes of footage not included in the original US release, and in the original Japanese language. Behold Godzilla!
Given Godzilla’s prevailing repute as a campy icon and comic superhero, the original Japanese version of his first film is a revelation even today, when viewed at a distance of 50 years. And although hundreds of people contributed to the film’s success, from low-echelon gofers to the special-effects crew, the sure guiding hand of director Ishirô Honda is most evident throughout the picture, conducting something akin to an orchestra of drama and horror storytelling, stark visual style, and ominous sound and music, all of which meshes together and plays out like a grand nightmare.
Director Biography
Perhaps no one deserves more credit for Godzilla’s longevity than the man whose epic cinematic style and sensitivity to the human condition are the enduring signatures of Toho’s kaiju eiga. Ishirô Honda will always be remembered as a director of monster movies, having helmed 25 special-effects pictures, including eight of the first 15 Godzillas. But he was also a visionary who transcended the limitations of the genre.
Godzilla®, Gojira and the character design are trademarks of Toho Co., Ltd. ©1954 Toho Co., Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
